Nigar Fatima v. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited

1. The present writ petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India seeks to assail the order dated 20.08.2019 passed by the learned Central Administrative Tribunal (the learned Tribunal) in Original Application (OA) No. 3844/2018. Vide the impugned order, the learned Tribunal has rejected the petitioner’s original application wherein she had sought that her son namely, Mujeebuddin Siddiqui, who had been appointed on compassionate grounds as a Group D employee in May, 2017, be appointed as a Group C employee.

2. In support of the petition, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that upon the death of her husband, the petitioner had applied for appointment of her son on compassionate grounds in 2012 as a Group D employee. However, before his case could be considered by the committee dealing with compassionate appointments, he completed his graduation and therefore, the petitioner submitted an application on 15.07.2016 to the Assistant General Manager of the respondent with a request that he be now considered for a Group C post. This fact was, however, not brought to the notice of the committee and consequently, the petitioner’s son was appointed as a Group D employee in 2017 instead of being appointed as a Group C employee, for which he was holding the requisite qualification when the committee recommended his name for appointment. She contends that the petitioner has been discriminated against, as while the case of the petitioner’s son for appointment on the basis of qualifications acquired by him during the pendency of the application has been rejected, similar applications of other candidates seeking the same relief were accepted. She, therefore, prays that the writ petition be allowed and the respondents be directed to appoint her son as a Group C employee with all consequential benefits from the date of his appointment.

3. On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents supports the impugned order and submits that the petitioner’s son, having without any reservation accepted the offer of appointment as a Group D employee, the present petition is liable to be rejected on this ground alone. Furthermore, the petitioner’s son is a major and, therefore, the petitioner has no locus to even propound his case. He finally submits that taking into account that compassionate appointment is not largesse but is only meant to help the family of a deceased employee to meet the sudden crisis on account of his death, the respondents are justified in directing that only qualification on the date of submitting application for compassionate appointment, would be considered. He, therefore, prays that the writ petition be dismissed.

4. In response, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that an application has been moved on behalf of the petitioner’s son seeking his impleadment as a co-petitioner. She, therefore, contends that the present petition may be treated as a petition on behalf of the petitioner’s son himself.

5. Having considered the submissions of learned counsel for the parties and perused the record, we are of the view that now that an application has been moved by the petitioner’s son to seek impleadment in the present petition, no useful purpose will be served by examining as to whether the petitioner had any locus standi to file the O.A. We, may, therefore proceed to deal with the petition on merits.

6. As noted hereinabove, the only grievance of the petitioner is that even though the certificate regarding the petitioner’s son having acquired a graduation degree was brought to the knowledge of the respondents in July, 2016, the committee did not take into account this fact and consequently recommended that based on the qualification held by him at the time of submitting his application, he be appointed as a Group C employee. In order to appreciate the rival submissions of the parties on this aspect, it would be apposite to note the relevant extract of the impugned judgment as contained in para 5, which reads as under:

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7. From the aforesaid, it is evident that when the application for compassionate appointment of her son was made by the petitioner on 23.01.2012, he was not a graduate and was, therefore, eligible only for appointment as a Group D employee. It is the respondent’s case that only the qualifications as held by the candidate on the date of submission of application for compassionate appointment are to be taken into account for considering the eligibility of the candidate. This, it has been urged by the learned counsel for the respondent, is an integral part of the scheme for compassionate appointment.

8. As has been consistently held by the Apex Court, compassionate appointment is an exception to the general rule for appointment by open advertisement and therefore can be resorted to only when the candidate and his family are in penury. Consequently, the eligibility for compassionate appointment is made on the basis of the policy for compassionate appointment framed by the employer. The eligibility of a candidate for compassionate appointment must therefore be considered strictly in terms of the policy. Taking into account the very nature of this policy which is an exception to the general rule, the Court cannot substitute its own views regarding the conditions laid down in the policy. In this regard, reference may be made to the observations of the Apex Court in para 20 of its decision in India Bank and Ors. vs. Promila and Ors. (2020) 2 SCC 729. The same reads as under:

9. Thus, it is clear that compassionate appointment is only meant to act as a succour for the grieving family when the earning member thereof dies in harness and, therefore, cannot be claimed or offered after a lapse of time when the crisis is already over. Compassionate appointment can never be a vested right and is primarily a discretionary relief to be granted strictly as per the terms of the scheme. Taking into account the very purpose of compassionate appointment, the respondents’ action in considering only the qualification at the time of submission of application and not those qualifications, which the family member may later acquire, cannot be said to be arbitrary in any manner. Accepting the petitioner’s plea that the later qualifications acquired by her son should have been taken into account by the committee would lead to a situation where the employer would be required to wait for years together for the children of the deceased employee to grow up and then acquire requisite qualification for compassionate appointment. This certainly cannot be the intent of compassionate appointment.